mtcookson

Cliffs notes at bottom 1975 280z stock engine. Fuel is being supplied, there is air, and there is spark. I'm pretty sure the injectors are firing but I'm not 100% sure. I know that when I pressurize the fuel system and supply a ground signal to the injectors all of them spray fuel correctly and with a nice pattern. One thing I'm not sure of is how the injectors are supposed to be wired. I thought I had them wired correctly (had to reqire the injectors for cylinders 4-6 and wired them according to the stock injetor wires) but when comparing them to the manual and injectors 1-3 they seem to be reverse. Voltage is going to right/bottom terminal (see my nifty drawing thingy below) when the key is in the on position and when I supply a ground to the opposite side they pop open correctly. injectors 4-6 (the ones i replaced the harness and wires on) left terminal = ground/no 12 volt signal right terminal = 12 volt signal when key is in on position / Retainer clip side ________ | __ __ | |___/___| / Injector side According to the thing above, does this seem correct or did I put the wires on backwards? I smell fuel on the plugs but I've held the throttle wide open and I would think they would be soaked in fuel but they aren't. Sometimes when I hold the throttle open all of the way I'll get some blackish smoke coming out the tail pipe as if it wants to fire but doesn't do anything more than that. I guess my basic question is, could it possibly be valve timing or maybe ignition timing? If its valve timing, according to my Chilton's book, the engine must be at operating temperature to space them correctly. As you can tell quite easily that's impossible for me to do. Is there a different measurement I should use when cold compared to the .025 for intake and .030 for exhaust or whatever when hot? Cliffs notes: 75 280z, stock everything. Getting fuel, spark, and air but will not start. Plugs smell like fuel but are pretty dry even after hold the tb at wot. All injectors spray fuel correctly, spark plugs are gapped correctly, and everything just plain seems correct. Could valve timing be an issue and if so, how would I space them with the engine cold? Thanks in advance!!

I had actually been planning on swapping this engine in my car and after seeing those pictures I definitely want to do it. The only thing I would change is I would have 1 turbo. I don't really like the idea of having two turboes... especially since you have to buy two of everything and I'm poor.

I put it up there but can't seem to figure out how it mounts up.... lol. I'll have to look around at some pictures and see if I can get an idea of where the bolt holes go and such.

Yeah, the car had been sitting for 2 years and had some real nasty gas in it. I tested the injectors and they still popped but I never checked the resistance. Earlier today after my last post I went back out and messed with it. The injectors started firing when the engine was cranking over. I either didn't have the screw driver on good enough the first time or something but they clicked. It still wasn't starting so I checked the spark, it was good. I then pulled the afm off and put my hand over the tb while my dad held the butterfly open and cranked it over and I was indeed getting vacuum so the only thing left was gas (unless the valves got out of adjustment which would tick me off since I've never messed with adjustable valves before). My dad and I thought that maybe the injectors were clogged or something because he pulled out 3 spark plugs and I held it at wot while cranking and there was no gas coming out at all so I'm in the process of changing them (previous owner bought a spare set of them). I noticed while I was changing them that there was still bad gas in there so I did some crazy hose setup to where I could have fuel flow freely through the lines and clean out any old gas there. I also thing the FPR might not be working properly so I'm going to put the spare on one there. Hopefully something will come out of all this that I've done tonight. Datsunlover, if you could send me or post up the resistance values that would be awesome. Thanks for all of the help everyone!

I got some files from a Z guy and it said in there that there is no priming and that the pump will only run when air is going through the afm (as said above). Its a safety setup to where if you're in a wreck and a fuel line breaks it won't keep spewing gas out. The engine has to die but it most likely would if a fuel line broke. I worked on it some more and found the problem to be my fuel pump. It is either internally or shorted or just plain fubar. I took it apart once more and tried to take it fully apart but had no luck so I put it back together. I hooked it to the battery again and it sounded as normal running at like, 50%. All of the sudden some dust came out and the thing just started moving real well. I hooked it up to some gas in a gas can and it kind of gurgled. I figured it did that since its a pusher pump and not a puller so I hooked it up to the car. Pushed in the afm and it ran and everything but wasn't getting any fuel. I thought about it for a sec and got the idea to flip the wiring around on the fuel pump. Sure enough once I did that the thing pumped fuel perfectly. I'm not sure what the hell happened to make it do this as I'm pretty sure i put it back together properly. I'm going to see if I can at least get the car started this way even though I don't like it. I'll just grab an aftermarket pump in the next day or so. Next thing I need to figure out is my injectors. For some reason they aren't firing so that appears to be the last step before getting this thing running again.

Not sure where else to post this so I figured this would be the best place to ask. Will the 260Z grill fit the 280Z? My 280Z didn't have the grill and I bought a bunch of parts together which included the 260Z grill. Anyone know off hand? Thanks in advance!

Sorry to pull a thread from the grave but with that MSD pump do you just bolt it in and go or are there any modifications that need to be done before it can work properly? Thanks in advance!

For those who don't like to read, cliff notes are on bottom right above my questions. I just recently bought a 75 280z and have been getting it to where it can run again (been sitting for 2 years). So far, I've fixed some wires that a damn pack rat ate through, cleaned up the thing's mess, put in new spark plugs and wires, new air filter (pack rat ate through that and made a nest in the air box which i cleaned up), i drained the fuel tank, put on a new fuel filter, and am getting ready to change the oil and oil filter. I cranked it over early on to make sure it wasn't locked up or anything and it cranked over beautifully. One thing I noticed though was that I never heard the priming charge from the fuel pump. I checked for more wires and looked around for a possible cutoff switch but didn't see any so I went on the tedious task of taking the fuel pump out. Got it out and touched the terminals to a battery... nothing. I was about to give up when all of the sudden I got the bright idea to take it apart. I took it apart and found the part that spins so I tried spinning it with my hand but it wouldn't spin. I put a rag over it and put some channel locks on it to break it free and it did so instantly. I could then spin it with my hands. I hooked it back up to the battery and it spun fine so I put it all back together and checked it again on the battery, still worked. I toss it in the car and turn the key to the on position to listen for the priming charge... still nothing. I got a multimeter out and hooked it up to the pump to see if I was getting any voltage. Turn to the on position and nothing however... when I try cranking the engine the voltage goes up to 7 or so volts, which doesn't seem correct to me at all. Cliff notes: Fixing up car, fuel pump doesn't work, take out fuel pump, its locked up, i free it, test it multiple times to make sure it works, put pump back in, turn key to on position for priming charge and hear nothing, hook up mulimeter and there is no voltage to do a priming charge, when i try starting the car the multimeter says there is only 7 volts being supplied to the pump. I guess my questions are, is there supposed to be an initial voltage for the fuel pump to prime the fuel system, is the voltage supposed to be lower like the 7 I had read or is it supposed to be 12, and I guess lastly could any of you point me to the location of the wires that go to the fuel pump and also the "electron fuel injection relay"? Many thanks in advance if you guys can help me out on this!

Sounds good. I'll search around a bit and see what I can find. I wasn't sure if the 280 had a smaller turbo than the Z so I just threw out a turbocharger i knew of (even though it is really small). In the end, I'm wanting to have either a VG30ET or a VG30DETT with a T3/60-1 and the whole works. That'll be a while down the road though. Thanks for you help!

So I read somewhere that the stock compression on an L28E is 8.8:1 which is not too bad for boost. How well would this engine handle with boost compared to the L28ET? I'm thinking of just doing the basics for a bit more power over stock until I can setup a better engine (not saying this engine is bad or anything ). The basics I'm thinking of are: injectors ET exhaust manifold small t3 turbo similar to what came on the Z31 upgraded fuel pump since i will definitely need it down the road ecu from turbo 280 (will this work on the 280Z?) various neccesary gauges (boost, maybe fuel pressure, dunno, etc...) I'm pretty much a full newb to the 280Z's but not to Nissans (check out my cardomain) but please don't be too harsh on me.

I'm definitely looking forward for the completion of this. I might be getting a 280Z myself and have been a fan of the VG30ET engines so I was planning on swapping it into there. How hard was the swap? Pretty much just a lot of fab work?

What is the difference between the 240's and the 280's that adds nearly 400 pounds to the car? Has anyone ever figure that out?? I'm looking to get a 280Z for a VG30ET swap and was just curious what the difference between them were. Speaking of the swap brings me to my next question... who all has done a VG30ET swap in here? If anyone has done it, how was it? Worth the time? Thanks in advance guys!

the vg30de should be an 8 bolt that uses a 240mm clutch. that's the main thing you need to worry about, the size of the clutch. since it appears the tranny is the z31 n/a tranny you will need a 240mm clutch for it to fit in the bell housing. a vg30de flywheel and clutch should work out for you. a good idea would be to go to a junk yard and try finding both of those and make sure it works out.

you should be able to use a vg30de flywheel and clutch. if you have or know of one that you can use to see if it will work i would try that before buying something.

6 the guys on z31.com say it looks more like the n/a tranny from the 84-89 300zx.

i talked to some z31 guys and they said if it's the borg warner T5 it will say borg warner on the side of it.

yeah, those engines came in the nissan leopard and only came with an auto. if it came from a z31 it could be one of three different trannies. it could be the normally aspirated 5 speed which won't hold much power but would suffice on stock power of that engine, i think. it could be the borg warner t5 tranny which will handle about 400hp or it could be the nissan built tranny which is similar to the tt tranny and will handle 500 hp. since you said the vg30dett flywheel barely fit in the bell housing i'm betting the tranny is either the borg warner t5 or the n/a tranny. the 84-86 300zx's had a 240mm clutch. the 87-89 had a 250mm clutch which i believe is what the tt uses. apparently, from the clutch kits i'm seeing, the vg30de flywheel will work with that tranny. the vg30de uses a 240mm clutch. from what i can tell on various clutch sites the splines are the same for the vg30de[tt] and the vg30et clutches so you should be able to use either. if the splines are interchangable i would stick with a vg30de clutch since you need to use a vg30de flywheel. i hope this works out for you. good luck!

is it auto? are you saying that the vg30de flywheel is 9.5 inch and the vg30dett flywheel is 10 inch? you may look on the tranny for a tranny code or something. if it is a nissan rwd manual it may look something like FS5R30A. if it's an auto then i'm not sure on the rwd tranny codes.

which tranny are you using?

Well, here is the update on my car. I am very close to getting it totally going. It would be running if it wasn't for the stupid Apexi S-AFC II not doing it's job. For some reason the s-afc doesn't want to change the fuel supply at all. I just found out my o2 sensor is bad so hopefully that could be the problem but it doesn't seem like. I plan on getting an eprom burnt for my spare ecu to control the bigger injectors but it could be a while before it's done. Here is the updated picture of the engine bay. Also, check out my cardomain page (link below). I finally have it fully updated with some pointers on the engine swap. Also if you could put some votes in on my car that would be great. Thanks in advance!

you should be able to use the flywheel from the dett. the det and dett are almost identical minus the intake and the head ports. if you have the cash, i would find a lightened flywheel for the vg30dett and bolt it right on to your det.

alright. i'll see what i can do. thanks!

yup, the vg30e(t) firing order.

that's what i'm doing right now but i don't really know what to do. i have cyinder 1 at tdc and the the rockers are loose (no pressure on them). i'm guessing since the firing order is 1-2-3-4-5-6 the intake valve of cylinder number two should be getting ready to close for the compression stroke.